today has been okay
by splendorousfire
Summary: Life without love is like a flower without petals. 240 word drabbles for Tyzula Advent. Complete.
1. Chapter 1

_**This is for Tyzula Advent. I hope you enjoy.**_

* * *

No one's gone in vain  
Here is where you'll stay  
'Cause life has been insane but  
Today has been okay  
"Today Has Been Okay" - Emiliana Torrini

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Azula never had felt so deeply and profoundly alone in her life. She didn't know what to make of it. Not in the slightest.

Ty Lee watched her from afar and loved her from afar. And truly, it pained them both.

Today, Azula was perched on a rock in the palace courtyard. She tried to meditate but couldn't find the balance. She never could find balance anymore.

Ty Lee watched from the window, gazing at this beautiful creature sitting all alone, seething with hatred for the world around her.

She was beautiful even when so bitter, like strong alcohol and Ty Lee was drunk on it. She could not help but gaze at the love of her life and think of nothing but the feelings that she hid.

She did not hide them well.

"Hey, Azula!" she called out from the window, her heart pounding wildly in her chest.

The princess looked up. She said nothing but could not fight the slight curl of her red lips.

Azula regally waved. Something about her mood improved but she could not quite place a finger on precisely what. However, she did everything in her power not to show it. Ty Lee did not need an ego and no one needed to know that Azula was ever anything but livid at the world and her circumstances.

Ty Lee waved back.

Azula's stomach did a backflip.

They both took deep breaths and pretended it never happened.


	2. Chapter 2

Azula stood on trial. An unofficial trial. It was not like the ones that deemed she was too young and too mentally unfit to do the right thing in the war. It was more like the ones her father forced her through constantly in his desperate attempt to control every aspect of her life and honestly it was not flattering on ZuZu.

He sat at the dining table. She stood with her arms crossed, uncertain if she should just walk out without answering his wildly invasive questions about Ty Lee.

A lock of her hair fell over her right eye, giving her a dark appearance that ought to have intimidated him into silence. Unfortunately, it did not work.

"We… dated before the comet. Are you satisfied, brother?" demanded Azula, glowering quite violently at Fire Lord Zuko.

His perplexed expression utterly infuriated her. How could he pass judgment when he spent so much time in the company of Mai? Between her and Ty Lee, she certainly was the less desirable one.

She forgot to hide her triumphant smirk and Zuko narrowed his eyes at her.

"What?" he asked.

She broadened her smile, a move she saved for special occasions. "Just thinking about how you settled for the lesser best friend. And how absurd it is you never noticed me and Ty Lee's affair."

Honestly, she felt quite satisfied with how this conversation went.

Zuko, on the other hand, absolutely did not.


	3. Chapter 3

**Trigger Warning: Eating Disorder**

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She felt empty. And it felt good.

Princess Azula lay in her bed with pangs of hunger in her stomach. They soothed and satisfied her on a deep level. Starvation felt like true comfort, the only comfort she had anymore. She had not eaten in forty-six hours and it felt amazing. It made her better than everyone else. It made her superhuman. It made her feel in control for the first time since Ty Lee betrayed her years ago.

Azula closed her eyes softly and took in a long, chilly deep breath. Unfortunately, her attempt at serene meditation to avoid craving for food was interrupted by a knock at the door.

The princess sighed and stood up, and as she did her head spun and her heart raced until she composed herself. Azula strode across the dimly lit room and opened the door.

Ty Lee stood there, beautiful, a bit disheveled, illuminated by the palace's evening candlelight in the halls. She smiled. It made Azula sick.

"You look beautiful tonight," said Ty Lee.

Azula did not reply. That statement held little meaning coming from Ty Lee.

Then Ty Lee added, "But sick. You look so tired and weak. Are you okay? Do you need anything?"

"That isn't any of your business," coolly said Azula.

Ty Lee nodded. "Can I come in?"

Azula stepped back and let Ty Lee enter.

They slept side by side that night.

Being beside Ty Lee felt even better than an empty stomach.


	4. Chapter 4

"I don't ever want to give you the wrong idea," said Azula.

Ty Lee chewed on her fingernails. She did not know what that meant but she was too afraid to ask. Her relationship with Princess Azula was too raw, too fragile. But then again…

Ty Lee tried to sound as innocent and airheaded as possible.

"What does that mean, princess?" inquired Ty Lee, batting her eyelashes and wearing her cutest puzzled expression.

"It means that you are fun. I care about you to an extent, but you are not the one I will spend my life with," said Azula coldly, picking at her nails and looking disinterested as Ty Lee's heart sunk into the pit of her stomach.

"I'm okay with that," whispered Ty Lee. "I'd take any time with you I can get. Even forever wouldn't be enough, anyway. So it doesn't have to be forever."

"I do…." said Azula reluctantly, "want you to know that despite my reservations you are worthy of my affection."

Azula took a wild chance and kissed her on the lips. They tasted as sweet as strawberries in summertime. Azula almost shivered but knew she had to contain herself.

She wanted to have cruel intentions in her relationship, and she needed Ty Lee to believe that to maintain the power imbalance.

But really?

Every time they kissed, Azula knew in her heart of hearts that Ty Lee was the one she wanted to spend her life with.


	5. Chapter 5

Azula sipped more from the bottle and then licked her lips. She rubbed her eyes and let herself sigh, since no one was around and no one could see how weak she was. She lost the only thing that made her human. A person. A girl with a braid and a wide smile.

Ozai raised Azula to be a cold weapon. Azula never felt like a human being until she fell in love with Ty Lee.

And now that was over. Ty Lee proved herself to be a heartless traitor and it only hurt when Azula laughed.

She took another swig from the bottle. All she wanted right now was too be drunk so she could forget that she was a failure with no friends and a lost love who only pretended to care about her. Only pretended. Of course she was only pretending and then she showed her true colors by choosing Mai.

Choosing Mai. Ty Lee was probably screwing her too.

Azula scoffed and stifled a laugh and held back her tears as she drank more and more until the bottle was less than halfway full. The world became fuzzy, her ears and face and skin warm, her vision a bit blurry, her stomach queasy. She wondered who made the room spin.

She looked up at the sky above from her bedroom window as she kept drinking despite her numbness and lack of any balance. She sighed at the stars.

"Help me," she whispered, a wish on a shooting star that would never be answered.

All she received in response was silence.

She finished the entire bottle and stumbled to bed, where she passed out and for a short while could forget about her lost love betraying her heart and burning her to ashes.


	6. Chapter 6

Azula glared at her brother. She was weary of speeches, tired of being told it was hard to be good, that she could become a hero if she wanted to, that she should do it for her happiness, her relationship with Ty Lee, her future family.

All the princess could say on the matter was, "We were heroes once. That was what we were supposed to be remembered as. That's what they all said we would be remembered as. Or have you forgotten?"

Zuko licked his lips and fell silent. Mai averted her eyes. Ty Lee was brave.

"History is written by the winners," said Ty Lee. "We just didn't get lucky."

"Luck is what losers call their failings," spat Azula, and she rose from the table.

Ty Lee pursued her as she stormed out of the room, and caught up to her in the hallway.

"Hey, princess-"

"I don't want to hear it. You're even worse than Zuko. Joining those peasant warriors who stood against us," Azula snarled, not regretting a single word although she knew she should not say them.

"We all make choices," said Ty Lee. "I chose to leave that life, no matter who I think was right in the war. I choose to be with you every single morning, every single afternoon, every single night."

"How heroic," Azula snarled.

"I choose to be with you even when you walk away," whispered Ty Lee, eyes glimmering.

Yet, despite her genuine words, Azula did just that, leaving Ty Lee behind.


	7. Chapter 7

Outside of the city lay the graves. Azula could remember the Earth Kingdom bodies hanged from stone and trees, swinging in the cold Ba Sing Se breeze. She never should have come back here, for no reason in the world, but Zuko took her and Ty Lee with him on his trip. She did not know why.

The memories could do nothing but hurt her as she walked over the hundreds of graves and breathed in the sick scent of magnolias and damp rocks. Ty Lee grabbed her hand and Azula tensed up.

"I'm here," said Ty Lee and Azula tried to pull away. But Ty Lee held onto her.

Azula wanted to slap her, her hand twitched, but Zuko and his guards watched and they would lock her up or punish her for doing that to the bodyguard who kept her in check and kept her happy in bed.

"I don't need you," hissed Azula, prying herself free from Ty Lee.

"I love you!" cried out Ty Lee. "It was right here where I realized I loved you. It was right here where I realized I could never live without you."

Azula looked down at her feet and the decaying bones deep in the ground beneath them.

Slowly, she turned around and did the bravest thing she ever had in her life.

"I have always loved you. I still do. Now follow me," ordered Azula, extending her hand.

Ty Lee eagerly took it.

They walked over graves, through streets once filled with their soldiers and beaten, bruised bodies, and to Iroh's tea shop, where they sat down in the guest room and did not speak for hours.

Yet, they still held hands.

They held hands as if, if they let go, they would permanently float away.

 **END**


End file.
